A/N: This chapter was supposed to be up yesterday, but every time I tried to get into Doc Manager, FF logged me out T_T. Gods, it was pissing me off. I'll try to update this story as often as possible, but life gets in the way. Now, I'm off to a short practice before a two-hour bus ride to a tennis tournament (we're not getting back until 10 or 11 and I have so much homework tonight and I get carsick and think I'm gonna cry). Anyway, please review to make my day better? :)
There is a pretty improtant message about future prompts down at the bottom, so if you're planning on prompting I'd really suggest you read that.
Prompt from zaire ashanti: When Brittany first got Lord Tubbington.
"Charity needs a boyfriend."
The Pierce family had been watching in amusement as their fluffy gray and white cat chase around a laser pointer for the last fifteen minutes (it was rare for the family to be together for so many consecutive minutes without a screaming match breaking out between Mr. And Mrs. Pierce, or the Mrs. Pierce and her son, so this was a nice change of pace), when their youngest child, Brittany, decided to break the relative quiet with her announcement. Now the family was, of course, used to Brittany saying random things, but when it came to cats, she was very serious. In fact, a very similar announcement (saying that their guinea pig Kirby needed a friend) had led to their adoption of Charity, the beautiful and intelligent Siberian that the whole family had fallen in love with.
They all had the feeling they were going to be getting another cat now.
"Britt," said Brandon, Brittany's high school-aged brother and also the only person who could ever have any hope of talking some sense into Brittany, "what makes you think Charity needs a boyfriend? She seems perfectly happy with just us."
"I saw her kissing her toy mouse again," Brittany explained without batting an eyelash, ignoring her mother's muted "Oh for heaven's sake!" and accompanying sigh. "She needs a boyfriend to kiss, because kissing a toy is just sad."
"Brittany," her mom, Brandy Pierce, said, 'tsk'-ing and shaking her head in a condescending way, "When Charity bites the toy, she isn't kissing it, she's just playing with it."
Brittany shook her head vigorously, eyes wide and sincere. "No, I'm telling you – she and the mouse were totally frenching."
"Do you even know what that means?" her father asked, concerned, because why would his eight-year-old daughter even be saying that.
"Yeah, Santana told me."
This caused Mr. Pierce to roll his eyes. Of course it would be that Lopez girl. She had never been a good influence on Brittany. "Well, Britt-Britt, I promise you that Charity was not frenching her mouse. She doesn't need a boy kitty."
"Actually," Brandon spoke up, "I read that Siberians like having the company of other people and animals. It might be good for Charity if we brought another cat around here."
Brandy raised her perfectly-plucked eyebrows. "Are you saying Brittany might actually have a good idea?"
"Yes, that's what I'm saying, Mother," Brandon replied snappishly; he was always defensive of Brittany, especially when their mother, who thought so little of the sweet but airheaded girl, put her down (their father didn't think so lowly of Brittany, but was too afraid of his wife to ever stand up to her for his daughter's sake). Brandon patted his ditzy little sister's blond head. "She has more good ideas than you give her credit for."
"If you like the idea so much why don't you buy her the cat?" their mother challenged as she took another sip of her red wine.
Brandon straightened his back and set his jaw stubbornly. "Fine, I will."
"Fine."
The room was filled with silence as it had been not five minutes ago, only this time the silence was tense, Charity was being ignored, and Brandon and Brandy were staring icily at one another. The silence was, once again, broken by Brittany.
"So… does this mean I'm getting a new kitty?"
~O~O~
"Brittany, are you ready to pick out your new cat?" Brandon asked a couple weeks later when he picked his little sister up from elementary school.
After much research, he had ultimately decided on a Maine Coon cat. They were large and fluffy, just like Brittany preferred, but low-maintenance. They were intelligent cats, and even though they weren't necessarily lap cats, they were playful and great with kids and other animals. They also had a habit of "talking back" to owners, something that had initially endeared Brittany to Charity (she convinced herself she was the cat whisperer and could hold conversations with the feline).
At her older brother's question, Brittany's face lit up like the Fourth of July and she hopped quickly into the car. "What are you waiting for?" she yelled impatiently. "Drive! Drive!"
For some unfathomable reason, Brittany made horse noises the entire drive to the pet shop. Brandon laughed and shook his head in bemusement, but didn't mull over it too much. He'd learned long ago that with Brittany, sometimes it was best to just go with it.
When they got to the store, Brittany was out the door and rushing across the parking lot before he'd even fully stopped the car. After he'd taken some time to calmly but seriously explain to Brittany why that was a bad and very dangerous idea, he took the eight-year-old's hand and the siblings made their way into the pet shop. Brittany was in heaven as her wide-eyed gaze traveled over the shop, taking in the cats and dogs and birds and rodents and fish, all in their specific sections and all looking so cuddly (well, except the fish, because fish were slimy and it was hard to hug them when they were always slipping out of her arms).
Brandon had checked ahead of time to make sure the store even had Maine Coons. Luckily for him and Brittany, they had three – two males, one female. He led Brittany over to the glass-front cages.
"Okay, Barbie," he said, using the nickname he'd given her when she was only two with the blond hair and blue eyes of a Barbie doll, "you get to pick from any of these." He gestured grandly at the three large cats and Brittany squealed and immediately ran up to the glass. Suddenly she turned the part of inspector, looking over the cats as thoroughly as she could through the glass.
Brandon left to go talk to a store clerk while Brittany continued her analysis.
After a few minutes, she got to the third cage and gasped. There, only a few inches away, sat the handsomest cat she'd ever seen. He was brown like chocolate, but with white on his mouth like he'd been drinking milk. His eyes were golden-green, his nose bright pink. His long fluffy tale was curled in front of him, and his fur all looked so soft! And he was so big, Brittany could just tell he'd be a great cuddler.
"Are you my new kitty?" she asked the large feline. He lifted his head at the sound of her voice, and then chirped back at her. She practically squealed – that was a yes! (And he could totally talk to her just like Charity.)
"Brandon! Brandon!" she yelled, jumping up and down with a huge smile on her face. "I found him! I found Charity's boyfriend!"
Brandon and the clerk made their way over to the excited little girl. There in the cage sat the most bored-looking cat he had ever seen. He didn't look in any hurry to get up until Brittany pressed her palm against the glass, and suddenly the cat was standing and walking over to the glass, purring and rubbing his chin and face against the spot where Brittany's palm touched the glass, only on the other side. Hmm, maybe Brittany was onto something with this whole "cat-whisperer" thing.
"He's perfect," Brittany whispered reverently.
But Brandon and the clerk noticed something at the same time. Oh shit, Brandon the glass window, a sticker clearly identified the cat as a female. Thank goodness Brittany didn't like to read.
"Actually, sweetie," the clerk began, "that kitty's a –"
"Perfect fit for the family!" Brandon quickly cut in, giving the clerk a significant look.
Thirty minutes later they were out the door, Brandon's arms weighed down with some fresh cat supplies, and Brittany holding their new cat under it's front arms. The cat was so long (38 inches, nose to tail, the clerk had told them) that the last inch of her tail dragged along the ground as Brittany carried her.
"You're really chubby," Brittany was saying to the cat. "Don't worry, I still think you're handsome. We just have to put you on a diet."
The cat yowled, either in protest to the diet idea, or because Brittany had stepped on her tail while climbing into the car with her. Of course, Brittany assumed it was the former. "Bad kitty! Don't use that language! And don't pout. How do you expect Charity to fall in love with you if you're like a rollie pollie?" The cat did appear to be pouting, and Brittany kissed her head in an attempt to make her feel better.
"Have you thought about what you're gonna name her – I mean, him, Britt?"
Brittany cocked her head, her ponytail swinging to the side. "Hmm… I think Charity will like him more if she thinks he's royal, because she's always gone for high-class men, so…"
"Prince Chubs?" Brandon suggested.
Brittany crinkled her nose. "No, not that."
"King Jiggles?"
Brandon could have sworn the cat sent him a look of death for even suggesting that name.
"I got it!" Brittany exclaimed suddenly. "Lord Tubbington!" She scratched under the cat's chin. "What do you think about that, Lord Tubbington."
The cat chattered back. Brandon couldn't tell if it was in approval, indignation, or simple response to Brittany's voice, but Brittany seemed to decide it was the feline giving it's consent.
"Lord Tubbington it is then!"
The cat returned to glaring at Brandon, only stopping to purr and keen when Brittany pet her or paid special attention to her.
The next morning Brandon woke up to a shredded pajama sleeve. He knew who to blame.
~O~O~
"Brandon, why isn't Charity in love with Lord Tubbington yet?" Brittany asked one Saturday morning several weeks later.
Because Lord Tubbington is really Lady Tubbington? "How do you know she's not in love with Lord Tubbington?" Brandon replied.
Brittany sighed. "Because I haven't seen them kissing." She looked up at her brother with sad eyes. "Why aren't they kissing?"
"Maybe Lord Tubbington has fish breath?" Brandon suggested in between his bites of scrambled eggs.
"But Charity has fish breath, too!" Brittany pointed out. "Has Charity told you anything she's not telling me?"
"Um… I, um…" His panicked eyes flew around the room, until he caught sight of a red and white box sitting on the itched counter. Cigarettes - their dad's vice. "Charity is upset because Lord Tubbington has started smoking," he said, as seriously as possible. It was completely ridiculous, and no sane, rational person would believe that lie. But this was Brittany.
Brittany frowned. She didn't know a lot about smoking, she just knew that her dad would put this white and orange stick called a 'cigarette' between his lips and it would glow all orange and pretty and make Brittany want to touch it, even though her parents, brother, and Santana had made it clear she never could, and then after Daddy finished smoking his mouth would smell like the kitchen did after that one time Mommy fell asleep while cooking roast beef.
Brandon also always said smoking was really bad for you and made you get stuck on them – he called it 'addicted – and if it was bad for you and it made you smell weird, she obviously couldn't let Lord Tubbington do it.
Lips set in a hard line, she left the table with a quick and solemn, "Thank you, Brandon," before running upstairs to search for her fat cat to give him a lecture about why he should quit smoking know before he got addicted if he ever wanted to get into Charity's pants (Brittany didn't know what that meant, but Santana had said it once, and even though it sounded silly since Charity didn't wear pants, Santana knew everything and Brittany wouldn't doubt her).
When Mr. Pierce got home that night, he was greeted by a pack of cigarettes flying through the air and hitting him square on the face. "Ow! What the–"
He looked across the room to see his angry-looking daughter holding their newest cat in her typical style. "If you get Lord Tubbington addicted to smoking, you're gonna be the one who has to pay for all his cigarette packs!" she yelled before storming off, Lord Tubbington's limp lower half swinging like a rag doll as she stomped up the stairs with the fat cat.
Mr. Pierce wondered if eight was too early to start suspecting drugs.
ABOUT PROMPTS (IMPORTANT): There were a few people in the first chapter who gave several prompts in their reviews. While I'm so happy to know that people would have enough enough idea they want to see me write, I'm going to have to change the rules on prompting a bit. I will only allow one prompt per person per chapter. That means that if you have two ideas, you'll have to post them in reviews for seperate chapters. If one review has more than one prompt, I will only fill the first one.
This is, of course, excluding people who reviewed the first chapter, before this rule was in place. Your prompts will all be filled, it just won't be in the steady chronilogical order that the rest of the story will be. If you are one of the reviewers with multiple prompts from the first chapter and would like to know when your second/third/etc. prompts are going to be filled, please PM me.
The reason for this new limit is the fact that I fill the prompts based on who reviewed first, and it's not fair for someone who requested one prompt and was the third reviewer to have to wait eight chapters to see their prompt filled because the people before them each made four requests. Please keep this in mind while prompting.
Thank you for reading :).